POLITICS & CULTURE
how cultural institutions warp LGBTQ identities Arts funding in particular tends to warp what it means to be LGBTQ+ By Adam Zivo
MAY / JUNE 2021
Ever since cultural institutions started taking equity more seriously, they’ve devoted a great amount of attention to uplifting the voices of LGBTQ artists. Grants are earmarked for queer projects; curators seek out queer voices; preferential treatment is given on the basis of gender and sexuality. For obvious reasons, this has often been a good thing. At the same time, these equity initiatives can distort how LGBTQ people craft their own identity. The push for inclusivity and diversity can, ironically, achieve the opposite effect. This is a particular risk when equity initiatives cultivate a victimhood mindset, subtly coercing LGBTQ people to infantilize themselves as perpetual victims, stultifying their voices by rewarding artists not for their merit, but for their ability to exploit narratives of oppression. Arts funding warps LGBTQ identities by incentivizing community members to see themselves primarily through the lens of their gender and sexuality. Every time an artist applies for a grant or project and is asked, somewhat obsessively, to tick themselves off on the oppression checklist, it serves as a reminder that this identity is considered essential to who they are. They never get to be just an artist – they are seen, from the outset, as a gay artist making gay art. This kind of identity reduction wouldn’t be such a big deal if there were no stakes involved. However, funding and opportunities are often allocated based on marginalization. That creates a strong financial and professional incentive for artists to play up their own marginalized identities, regardless of how they authentically feel about these identities in their own lives. In this faustian bargain, they are paid to perform victimhood. Understanding how this works requires a little understanding of the broader context of things. Since the Civil Rights era, many Western institutions have had to reckon with their roles in perpetuating social oppression. Universities have had to introspect on how their systems have excluded the racialized. Legal systems have had to contend with their history of muting women’s voices. Museums have had 46
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to unbury queerness. The examples are limitless – but, regardless of specifics, broadly speaking the effects on these institutions have largely been the same: a profound loss of moral authority and, with it, an enduring sense of illegitimacy. This loss of moral authority is one of the main reasons why institutions have invested a dizzying amount of work into rectifying past wrongs. It’s good, of course, to correct past injustices and uplift the excluded. Restorative justice is important. Yet, at the same time, this search for moral authority can have unintended consequences. Chafing under the weight of their pasts, institutions have a strong incentive to infantilize the marginalized rather than empower them. When institutions are preoccupied with washing away historical guilt, they’re prone to manufacture victims in need of saving – the more pitiful the victim, the easier it is to play the role of the saviour. The pitifulness of the victim necessitates the enlightened generosity of the former oppressors, and, in this way, institutions ironically continue to monopolize power, because the marginalized, rather than being vested with autonomy and dignity, are instead turned into a community of invalids waiting to be taken care of. It’s not so different from a co-dependent romantic relationship, where one side quietly enjoys playing caretaker and so enables, even encourages, fragility in the other side. Perhaps this is why arts institutions are so preoccupied with not only reducing LGBTQ people to their orientation and gender, but pressuring them to express themselves in a way that centres on grievance and struggle. The goal for the institutions is not authentic empowerment, but the perpetuation of the victim-patron relationship. Through amplifying historical injustices, cultural institutions are better able to manage their guilt, developing a system in which they’ve elongated the process of restorative justice so they can better latch onto it. They have the comfort of knowing that they
